


Think You I Am No Stronger

by sentientcitizen



Category: Firefly, SHAKESPEARE William - Works, Serenity (2005)
Genre: Collection: Purimgifts Day 2, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-18
Updated: 2011-03-18
Packaged: 2017-10-17 02:24:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/171930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sentientcitizen/pseuds/sentientcitizen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three Shakespeare-inspired scenes set in and around the events of "Serenity".</p>
            </blockquote>





	Think You I Am No Stronger

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hippyjolteon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hippyjolteon/gifts).



> After writing my PurimGift treats this year, but before the reveal, I received the sad news that my recipient HippyJolteon had passed away. After conferring with the mods, it was decided that in keeping with HippyJolteon's desire to participate in the exchange, the best and most respectful thing would be to post the stories. My deepest sympathies to hir friends and loved ones for their loss.
> 
> * * *
> 
> Title is from Shakespeare's "Julius Ceaser"; "Think you I am no stronger than my sex?" Portia protests to Brutus.

_Katherina and Petruchio_

Serenity is panting through the darkness, racing towards Book and Haven, when Zoe blows on her tea to cool it down and asks, “You think you might stay on this time ‘round, ‘Nara?”

Inara is far too poised to heave a sigh. Instead, she takes a delicate sip of her tea before answering, blunter than she means to, “He thinks I’m a whore.”

Zoe opens her mouth to say something, but Inara shakes her head, and the first mate pauses.

“It’s not the slur that bothers me. The thing the Captain doesn’t understand,” she says, choosing her words carefully now, “is that the difference between Companion and whore isn’t the Academy, or the cost of our services.” Wasn’t Nandi proof enough of that? “The difference is that you pay a whore for the right to her body; you pay a Companion for the privilege of her time.”

Zoe narrows her eyes, thinking. “This ain’t all just ‘cause the Cap’n don’t grasp the finer nuances of Companioning.”

“Yes and no,” Inara says, pursing her lips. “Mal thinks he can saves me from selling myself away. But I’m _don’t_ sell myself. My clients are like suitors, seeking my favour. If they don’t abide by my rules, they loose the chance to come court me again. Mal will never be content to court me, Zoe. He a wife. He wants to _own_ me. He’ll make me a whore to save me from whoring.”

“He wants you safe,” says Zoe, and Inara very carefully does not clench her jaw. She should have known Zoe wouldn’t understand. Wash never wanted her to change her. Inara sets down her tea, prepared to make a gracious exit - and then Zoe adds, “But he reckons ‘safe’ for a women like you means... tame. Domestic, like.”

Inara relaxes back into her seat, the start of a smile on her lips. “I’ll not be caged for my own protection,” she says firmly, “and I have _no_ intention of being tamed.”

Zoe grins, and raises her tea a gesture somewhere between a toast and a salute. “Hell, I knew there was a reason I liked you, ‘Nara.”

 

 _Viola and Sebastian_

The others think she’s is dead. She can hear it in their heads; Kaylee crying on the inside, trying not to let it out. Have to be strong. Have to hold together now. But River _is_ together, her pieces laid out in tidy rows for the first time since the blue hands broke her into sharp shards of self. She’s not fixed yet, have to put it all back where it came from, but all the bits are here, a thousand tiny boxes waiting to be opened.

Simon’s screaming in her head, wants to call her back. Screaming is good. You don’t touch a choking man until he can’t cough. You don’t circle the wagons until the drums stop.

No touching knives, that’s the rule, but rules are made to be broken and Simon will understand. Serenity is wreaked but they’ve on the beach. Can’t die now. Wear the mask and play the Duke’s page - got to do the job or we don’t eat. Reavers keep coming, waves on her shore, Rivers turned to blood. Cap’n might be mad, Kaylee might be sad, but maybe if you dress a girl in trousers, make her a weapon and send her off to war, she won’t stop being a girl.

Simon protects her, makes her better. But now Simon needs to be protected. Simon needs a Simon. Paradox; twisting, folding inward. Gordian knot; have to cut it. Simon needs a Simon, so she has to _make_ a Simon. Only answer. Only logical, really. Have to be the big brother, when the big brother can’t be there. River who is Simon who is River, flowing onward. If she can’t stand on her own two legs, she’ll borrow his.

But only until she finds the box where they hid her wings.

 

 _Juliet and Romeo_

When Kaylee tells her family about Simon, cousin Mercy thinks it’s awful romantic, a fancified core doctor falling all head-over-heels for a grease-monkey rim-planet girl.

“You meet his family yet?” Mercy wants to know, the two of them lying side by side in the dust and staring up at the ships as what come in to land at the port. They used to watch ships all the time, afore Serenity.

Kaylee stares up at the ships in the blue sky. She can’t help but to make a list in her head, figuring out by the look and the sound of them which parts Daddy and Pappy’re gonna need to fix them up when their Cap’ns come by the shop.

“Not yet,” she says after a minute, ‘cause she reckons if she keeps quiet any longer Mercy can’t help but to worry. How’s she meant to explain about River, about how Simon’s _hun dan_ daddy told him they was on their own, how Simon’s still so scared, even though he ain’t a fugitive no more, but trying so hard to hide it from her? Instead, she says, “He’s workin’ his folks ‘round. Gotta be a shock to ‘em, him bein’ with some’un like me.”

She means as to make a joke, but Mercy takes it all serious-like. “Why, Kaylee, you’re like star-crossed lovers! You reckon your Mamma feels the same about Simon his Mamma does about you?”

Kaylee don’t know how to tell Mercy is ain’t like that. It ain’t a story; it’s real life. It’s messy and complicated and – she finds that she’s started grinning, all quiet like. If this’d been a story, he’d’ve swept her oof her feet, all a-like prince charming. So how come she did all the work, huh? Flirting and carrying on and all but beating him to the floor, bless his proper little heart.

Naw. It ain’t a story. It’s so much _better_.

**Author's Note:**

> The women of firefly, out of costume but looking every bit the totally kickass ladies they are. :) Image via [FanPop](http://www.fanpop.com/spots/firefly/images/62696/title/women-firefly-photo).


End file.
